Fire!

So my blog went down, full story to be found here. I only found out about it afterwards, and even then, there wasn't much I could do. I hadn't broken it; I hadn't even set it up in the first place, so although I had some idea how to use it, I didn't know how to fix it when it stopped working. All I could do was alert the powers that be and sit back, knowing that I wasn't the only one who'd been affected -- in fact, in the grand scheme of things, I was probably one of the least affected -- but knowing that something had gone wrong and hoping that somebody out there could and would put it right.

So, a lot like life in 2006, except that there actually was somebody there to listen and the problem got fixed.

I just got an "investor's-alert" e-mail with the following sentences, designed to get past the spam filters:

Furthermore, an usually spartan light bulb gets stinking drunk, and an earring pours freezing cold water on a soggy tornado. When you see a tattered minivan, it means that a movie theater related to a grizzly bear gets stinking drunk. A hairy defendant is flabby. An impromptu nation trades baseball cards with the tuba player inside the parking lot. An abstraction of an umbrella laughs out loud, and a slow abstraction hesitates; however, the support group behind the insurance agent buys an expensive gift for a skinny vacuum cleaner. Some judge from the cyprus mulch finds subtle faults with a seldom obsequious jersey cow. Another CEO inside a warranty takes a coffee break, and a so-called pickup truck leaves; however, a fundraiser beyond an ocean knows a roller coaster from a blithe spirit. When you see the wheelbarrow, it means that some carpet tack from a salad dressing starts reminiscing about lost glory. When the proverbial pine cone hibernates, a college-educated graduated cylinder wakes up. The freight train for a mortician has a change of heart about a satellite. Sometimes the college-educated jersey cow flies into a rage, but a wisely obsequious hole puncher always knowingly gives lectures on morality to a tomato!

It's weirdly beautiful in its Markov-chain-generated way, like a horoscope written by James Joyce.

My office-mate at work has become assistant deputy unpaid volunteer fire warden safety marshal, or something, and she left some of her training pamphlets on the desk.

I'm all in favour of fire safety, because my IQ is higher than three, but as I've mentioned before, it's not the why of these things, it's the how. And the fact that the City of Toronto's fire safety department's initiative is called "The War on Fire" just makes me want to burn the pamphlet.

"Protect your family! Protect your home! Join The War On Fire!"

Yeah, because declaring war on abstract anthropomorphised concepts always works so well. Why not start smaller and declare a limited military engagement against oxygen?

It will, I hope, never cease to amaze me that people get paid to think this shit up.